Don't Close Your Eyes Page 5

  It’s warm for spring. The heavy orange skies stretch out overhead, filled with the perfume of new grass. It’s nosebleed weather and I’ve had three today already. There are bright splatters all over my gingham dress. I’m standing in the school office holding a soaked tissue under my nostrils and the school secretary is telling me to lift my head back.

  “No.” The teacher with the first-aid certificate rushes over. “Don’t hold your head back like that, just keep it still like this. Here’s a fresh tissue.”

  “I was thinking of the carpet,” I hear Mrs. Woolacombe—the secretary—grumble as she sits back down by her desk and takes a bite of her sandwich.

  They’ve been trying to call Mum but there’s no answer. I convince them that she’ll be in the garden and just won’t have heard the phone. The secretary looks at me, my dress and the carpet. “If your mum’s not there,” she says, “you need to come straight back.”

  I’m giddy from being out of school, the lunchtime sun on my arms. I feel alive with the rushing sounds of the adult world all around me as I run home, nose throbbing.

  I get to our front door, freshly painted green by Dad, something Mum’s been asking him to do for years. It’s not locked, and I guess Mum’s probably in the garden lying on a sun lounger with oiled legs and a Twix.

  I close the door quietly, hoping to get to my room to change clothes before telling her about the blood on my dress. As I step toward the stairs, I hear a noise in the living room. It sounds like Mum’s laughing, or maybe singing, but sort of faster than usual and not in tune. And then I hear another noise. It’s like a grunting sound, like a dog might make while it snuffles around, smelling things in thick grass. I stand still and catch a tiny drop of blood working itself loose from my nostril.

  I touch the banister, thinking about making my way up, but I can’t help myself and I have to look. I tell myself that I’m checking everything is okay, but I’m not. I’m curious and a bit frightened and I just can’t stop myself from pushing my eye up to the gap between the open door and the frame and looking in. It’s dark, and I hadn’t noticed the curtains had been tugged shut when I walked past the front of the house. There’s no light on, just the orange glow of the outside framing the curtains.

  Drew Granger is lying on the sofa and there is a fan of blond hair spreading out under him. He’s topless, pink-skinned, and his trousers are loose around his middle. I can’t see most of my mum, just her hands and arms clasped tight around his back, and her new summer dress in a pile on the floor.

  He’s tall and broad, kind of barrel-shaped, but not fat. Just big. My dad is narrow, wiry. He says he’s built like a monkey, which is good for climbing trees. Drew Granger is more like a gorilla: hairier, bigger, louder. Powerful.

  I’ve never seen anything like this before. The only man I’d ever seen naked was my dad, and only occasionally. When I needed a wee and he was in the bath, or the time the washing machine flooded the kitchen first thing one Saturday. Robin and I had started screaming and yelling and Dad had appeared out of nowhere, stark naked, to turn off the water. I don’t like the size of Drew Granger. I don’t like how he swamps my mum, and I really don’t like the fact that she seems to like it so very much. My poor narrow monkey dad. I think of him shinning up the old oak, working so hard for us, and I feel tears welling.

  I hurry back to the front door and out onto the little front garden. I rush down the road, past the Grangers’ BMW, which I hadn’t noticed on the way in, and walk back into school, still holding to my nose the wrinkled red tissue that I’d left with.

  “No one was in,” I say to Mrs. Woolacombe without meeting her eye.

  ROBIN|1991

  Something’s up with Sarah but Robin doesn’t know what. Seeing her sister distracted by something secret is disconcerting, and it chews at her thoughts more than Robin would have expected. Normally Sarah is a fountain of criticism and do-goodery, but she’s barely sniped at her twin for days and hasn’t told on her all week. Instead, Robin notices that Sarah is spending more time in her room than usual and is obviously avoiding their mother. One curious effect of this, which Robin’s not sure yet if she likes or not, is that Angie is spending more time with Robin.

  So far this week, Robin has had a haircut—her mother agreeing for once that she could have it shorter than her shoulders—and though there were some cross words in both directions, Robin was even invited to go to Safeway to do the weekly shopping. A treat disguised as a chore on account of being able to choose a comic and some sweets at the till and having the illusion of a say over dinners for the week ahead:

  “Hot dogs, Mum?”

  “Good idea. I’ll do toad in the hole, Robin.”

  Her dad’s not quite himself either. He stares at the TV but doesn’t laugh at the funny bits. He left some dinner uneaten earlier this evening and it was a mixed grill. That’s his favorite. Even Sarah raised her eyebrows back at Robin as she noticed their father’s half-finished plate on his tray. Also Jack and Angie don’t seem to be bickering; it’s like they’re both holding their breath all the time. Normally Robin’s mum would have stood over Jack, demanding to know what was wrong with the pork chop, fried egg and sausage that had been so uncharacteristically ignored. But she didn’t seem to notice.

  As her dad moved his leftovers around the plate with his fork, resting his cheek on his free hand, Robin asked what the plans were for the weekend. She was hoping for a beer garden, where she, Sarah and Callum could run wild, and not the worst-case scenario—a craft fair.

  “I’m not sure yet, Robin,” Angie had said, and Robin and Sarah both noticed that their dad had stopped pushing his food and was looking at his wife. He didn’t look surprised exactly, but there was something odd about it.

  Now Sarah is in her room again, having an early night. The idea appalls Robin, who would rather chain herself to the sofa with her eyelids pried open than willingly go to bed. The doorbell chimes and the three remaining Marshalls look at each other. Eventually Angie sighs one of her dramatic world’s-end sighs and heaves herself off the sofa to go to open the door.

  “Hiya,” Robin hears her mum say, “you want to come in?”

  There’s the telltale mwah mwah of stage kisses but without the effort or humor they used to carry. Just air now.

  “Hi, Jack.” Hilary’s soft voice reminded Robin of women from coffee adverts.

  “All right, love,” her dad replies, flicking his eyes at Hilary briefly and smiling, then looking back at the screen.

  The two women go into the kitchen to talk. Their blue-gray cigarette smoke seeps under the closed door, and the sound of the kettle springs on and off for the next couple of hours. It works out very well for Robin, whose dad generally doesn’t remember to put her to bed if she keeps quiet enough.

  Hilary is about to leave now, but she comes into the living room and quietly asks Robin’s dad if their plan to go to the garden center at the weekend is still on. Robin’s ears prick up, practically standing on end when she hears Jack confirm that, yes, that’s still a definite plan, when just a few hours ago her question about the weekend had been brushed away.

  “Perhaps we could all get lunch afterward,” Hilary adds, looking at Robin.

  “P’raps,” says Jack.

  No mwah mwahs at all as she leaves.

  Robin’s dad suddenly notices the small child curling into the corner of the sofa, watching TV that she doesn’t understand. “Come on, then, squirt, off to bed,” he says, seeming to come to life for the first time that day.

  That weekend, they didn’t get lunch together. Callum came round to the Marshalls’ house and he, Robin and Sarah stayed inside watching The Chart Show and a Carry On film while Angie went window-shopping and their dad went to a garden center with Hilary. And Angie and Jack had still not bickered by then. Something was up.

  ELEVEN

  SARAH|PRESENT DAY

  6. Too Much Control

  What does that even mean? As he’d said it, I noticed that Jim’s mothe
r was nodding slightly. I doubt she even knew that she was moving her head, but it told a story. I’d always had self-control. It had often disappointed me that it was the women who’d looked down at that.

  My appetites, my inclinations.

  After slipping just once, I’d cultivated that control and was proud that it had seen me through. Perhaps he had meant too much control over Violet. Who can control a three-year-old to excess? They’re the Wild West of children. No longer babies, no longer easy to pen in a cot or high chair but too young to reason with. Besides, Violet is a good girl; she doesn’t need control. Our boy, my boy, he’d be the little rascal. The one beyond my control.

  I had always said I wanted two children. I hoped for a girl and then a boy. Jim had always wanted two children as well. He said he didn’t mind if they were boys or girls. I said I didn’t mind too. My dad used to tell the same lie, but any fool could see that he’d wanted a boy. Robin scratched that itch in a way I never could. It worked out very well for her.

  There was a lot I had to learn in preparation for a life with Jim. A lot I had to unlearn.

  I tried to be attentive, but it was hard to know what that looked like. I hadn’t had the best examples.

  Jim liked to eat with Violet as soon as he got in from work. As she grew up, he liked to do her bathtimes and bedtimes—the evening shift, he called it. He liked to strip out of his work things, shower the day off and get into his joggers and T-shirt, ready for dinner. His at-home uniform. He didn’t really like my cooking as much as he’d politely suggested in the beginning and started making more and more requests, remarks. It was hard to keep up. I often made mistakes. Not just with the food.

  I still get it wrong, even now. The more I tried to fix things after the list was read out, the worse I made it. Eventually I had to stop and regroup. Refocus. But it had taken a while to realize that. At first, I just spun my wheels and sprayed mud all over myself.

  It’s been four days since the list was read out.

  The first night away from my home had been sleepless and bewildering. I wasn’t in the bed I’d woken up in that morning; nothing smelled the same. The following day, I didn’t need to get up at the sound of Violet’s call. I had no use.

  The pull to her was as strong as ever though. I stayed away most of the day, trying to do as I’d been told. But I couldn’t. I’d shown up at our place with a teddy bear for Violet. The lights were off and the house was empty. My key no longer worked. The sheer speed of this project chilled me. The taxi had started rolling back out of the close we’d lived in, but luckily the driver saw me running after him. It was obvious where they’d be. I wondered how long it had been planned and when Violet’s Trunki suitcase must have been packed behind my back. While I was washing and folding her clothes, was Jim squirreling them away? I tried not to think about it, tried to swallow away the burning rage in my chest. I even asked the taxi driver to swing into the petrol station so I could buy flowers for Jim’s mother. Habit.

  When we pulled up at Jim’s parents’ home, Jim’s car was on the drive. Had he booked the day off work in advance or called in that morning? The logistical questions made my head swim. I asked the driver to wait this time, knocked on the door more sharply than I’d intended. When Jim’s mother answered the door, I could hear my girl’s laughter bursting out of another room. I handed Jim’s mother the flowers and asked to come in. She’d stared at me, this woman who had once told me how grateful she was for my care of Jim. Of Violet. Now she stared like I’d asked to see her kidneys.

  “Please?” I said again, my voice cracking.

  Violet’s laughter had stopped. She called for me and came running to the door. She was wearing a new pink dress, her wavy golden hair bouncing as she ran toward me, her eyes ablaze. I’d managed to grab at her to hug her just as Jim skidded into the hall behind her and whipped her away into another room. “No!” I’d called after them. “Please!”

  “You need to leave, Sarah,” his mum had said, looking down at both our feet and moving the door closer to the frame so I couldn’t look around it.

  “But you said you wouldn’t keep her from me.”

  “We said you needed to get help and then perhaps—” she’d started, raising her face to look at mine just briefly. Tears rolled hot down my cheeks. I didn’t have the words so I balled up my fists.

  “You need to go, Sarah. If you don’t,” she took a deep breath and whispered, “we’ll need to get the police involved, and I’m sure you don’t want that.”

  “I just want Violet! I’ve not done anything wrong,” I cried, louder than I’d hoped.

  “If you think you’ve done nothing wrong,” Jim’s mother had said, suddenly matching my volume, “you’re madder than we thought.”

  The taxi driver dropped the chitchat and drove me back to the B&B in silence. I leaned my head against the car window so my jaw vibrated with the engine and the tears traced zigzags on my face.

  I tried again yesterday. Jim and his parents watched from the window as I hammered on the door until it bounced in the lock. When I tried again today, Jim came outside, grabbed my arm and marched me back to the taxi as if I were an unruly drunk.

  I went to the bank before I could talk myself out of it, drained his account with the card he’d given me for shopping, took out the small sum that I’d saved in my own account, packed all the money into my holdall and caught the bus to Guildford.

  I stepped down from the bus at the train station, went inside with my holdall. Jim was dead to me, Violet was held from me, there was only one person left. Being turned away by Robin wasn’t an option. I needed my twin.

  The man behind the counter smiled at me, and it was the first smile I’d received in a while. Through streaming eyes and a breaking voice I said, “I need a one-way ticket to Manchester.”

  ROBIN|PRESENT DAY

  Robin was four thousand steps into her pacing when she stopped by the curtain in the top bedroom. She’s still standing there, on pause. There have been no knocks today, and somehow the anticipation is worse than the reality. Will it be more aggressive today? Will the knocks rain down for longer? Will whoever is knocking appear at the back door instead? Will they wait until after dark and climb onto the roof of the kitchen, tease the window of the spare bedroom open with gloved fingers, drop silently to the floor like a cat and stalk around her house while she sleeps?

  She couldn’t sleep last night. Lay awake until the early hours, battling to keep the thoughts of the past out, failing to keep the fears of the present in check. In the end, she pulled herself off the bed and, rather than climbing under it, headed to the gym to tire herself out with kettlebell squats and miles on the static bike.

  It had worked, of sorts. After cycling nowhere for fifteen miles, she’d made it to two hundred and eighty squats, pausing briefly every twenty, closing her eyes for the last three sets. It was an equal number at least, round and smooth. She’d shuffled back out of the spare-room-cum-gym, into a hot shower and then up the second set of stairs and into the top bedroom. There she’d given up any pretense of a normal night, wrapped the duvet around herself and crawled under the bed.

  Now it’s afternoon. Her knees are still aching and her sore leg muscles feel hard and inflexible. Robin leans toward the window, resting one hand on the sill to stare out the back of her house. She sees that the Magpies are both at home but no sign of their little boy. It’s unusual for both the Magpies to be home before teatime. Just the briefest of glances at their body language, the way they’re circling each other, shows that everything is wrong.

  She looks away, scans up to the student woman but her flat is abandoned, an empty cereal bowl still on the table from the night before. No sign of the old people, Mr. and Mrs. Peacock, but the young guy Robin had watched moving in is leaning against the garden wall, smoking. He stubs the cigarette out on the wall, drops the butt and walks slowly back inside.

  Robin flicks her eyes back to the dead center and watches the Magpies. They’re still circling e
ach other just behind the window, pieces of paper and small items being tossed about. Mrs. Peacock has now been shaken loose, perhaps from the shouting that doesn’t reach the distance to Robin. She’s standing outside her flat, the broom in her hand motionless, her head craned.

  It’s nothing new. But it’s probably entertaining enough for a bored pensioner. Robin’s in no position to judge. She tells herself that she’s acting as a kind of custodian, watching over the lives opposite. But if she examines that claim for long, it falls apart. If she were really just a caring witness, she’d spend more time worrying about the young mum looking after the baby by herself, pacing at night with it red-faced and screaming. She’d worry about the old people, the old woman caring for herself and her husband, who is looking increasingly frail and keeps wandering out of the flats, only for Mrs. Peacock to round him up at the last minute and coax him back inside.

  No, Robin’s interest is not solely benevolent. Mr. and Mrs. Magpie were an important part of her coping strategy. They were true north. They were good and wholesome, a reminder of what normal families look like. She doesn’t want to see them as Henry and Karen Watkins, another screwed-up couple. It’s knocked Robin’s whole system out of whack, confronting the idea that maybe there are no good families. She’d thought her family was pretty perfect, once upon a time. Believed that her parents were good and her siblings were forever. But like all good fairy tales, the story was far, far darker than that.

  TWELVE

  SARAH|1991

  Ever since I saw Mum and Drew on the sofa, I’ve been seeing the ghost of that image everywhere I look. The new clothes Mum is wearing, the looks Drew gives those clothes, the way Hilary is wearing less makeup, the miles-away look on Dad’s face. A look that says maybe he knows. Our families still meet up but there’s a strange feeling, like we’re on the edge of a cloud but the rain never falls. One mean word and everyone might start barking like dogs.